Trials and Tribulations
by WinchesterNimrod
Summary: The slime villain opens a dormant part of Bakugō's mind, and quickly comes to regret this decision. [Saitama is Bakugō]
1. Prologue

This is prologue is short, but I plan on chapters being very long.

I've only watched a bit of My Hero Academia, but i've read a whole heap of fanfic. If my characters are a bit off, so very sorry. I'll work harder. This idea came to me just this evening and ahaha, i've already plotted a fair bit of this story. Desperately need to share it with you guys. More chapters await~~

...

Prologue

...

"_I don't_ –"

Bakugō Katsuki arches under the impact of the villain. Slimy bone fingers splitting his mind open – forcing it to break and swallow something it doesn't want. Curls away from and screams.

Green, vile sewage fills him until Katsuki's eyes roll to the back of his head. He feels himself drifting towards unconsciousness. Darkness slithering the outer edges of his wavering vision.

"_Stop stop stop - I don't want this_ -"

'Trust me,' the villain giggles.

Impatient fingers peels his mind away like shell off boiled eggs.

'This will be over in a sec….wait - '

Katsuki's fights. Senses clouding, darkness pulling him in – Katsuki fights with every molecule in his body to stay awake.

"Kacchan!"

An ear shattering scream tugs at Katsuki like a hand yanking him out of the water.

Through the muck of piss and shit smothering his body, Katsuki smells nitro-glycerine.

Through one uncovered eye, he see's good-for-nothing Deku running at him, mildly-chaotic expression mixed with unnerving determination to get to him. School bag swinging.

In the distance he see's heroes stationed at the police perimeter yelling at Deku to stop. Resembling alarmed rodents.

In his curdling, broiling mind Katsuki hears the villain screech: 'wait what's – how - _who the hell are you?!_ '

The peeling stops. Katsuki shouts at a sobbing Deku: "Get back you fucking moron!" and blows…

But it was too late.

'I don't care if you were here first he's mine now!'

"Oi! Don't fucking – "

In one great heave, the villain skins Katsuki's mind like a cat.

Into the darkness, into the void, Katsuki plunges.

Briefly, very briefly the villain gains control.

"Kacchan!"

.

One simple second of manic laughter, unshed tears in red disillusioned eyes – and it stops and something_ – something_ wakes up.

"What the heck?"

It wasn't the villain who had said it. Control slips like melting ice in warm hands.

"Man, get out," the _things_ says. "It's gross."

And the villain feels fear.

The kind people get when they're home alone and hear something move. The kind that's like a cool lick to the back of the neck, the sudden drop of missing a step on the staircase. Or a car rushing by on a crosswalk. Or staring down the barrel of a gun on the way home.

It was like he was feeling it for the very first time in his life.

And wanted none of it.

'_Incredibly sorry for the intrusion!'_ slime trembling and bubbling in gushing fright_ 'I'll get going now! So sorry!'_

Just as jerking the plug from a bathtub, he comes rushing out. Pulling every bit of himself from the boy. Dropping him like hot coal.

He doesn't know how it happens. But the millisecond he hurriedly tugs the last of himself free – like chewing gum from the sole of a shoe - nitro-glycerine _fumes_.

"Huh, is that me?" the child audibly wonders.

And the alleyway is engulfed in fire.

...

Please review (:


	2. Chapter One

_Story isn't dead, promise!_

_Swears a bit because he's still Katsuki. _

…

Chapter One

...

Saitama is Katsuki.

He's not quite sure what to make of it.

There is no fear, no anxiety about his identity. He knows who he is, who he was. From the day he was born to the day he died.

Instincts, relationships, joy, and pain –it all swells in his mind like cake inside a scanty tin. Expanding and pushing beyond the capacity it was poured into.

["_….dead... self-defence…Midoriya boy didn't….too early to say…_"]

There is no excitement of his power – no orgasmic invincibility he always dreamed of experiencing.

Infinitesimal strength was as familiar and dull as it always had been.

["_…probably in shock….All Might…official apology…_"]

There is no happiness to being alive or being a hero.

Only exhaustion. Boredom.

The kind that seeps into bone marrow like led. Draws into the rib cage like a black hole.

Bakugō Katsuki feels there should be more to his life than this - recalls waking up this morning like a star manifesting from a bright explosion. Anticipated, sparking, raging, broiling, _feeling_.

Not a burnt out star. Dwarfing. Weary from power.

_Existence_.

["…_if he continues like…Therapists are…._"]

Katsuki is Saitama.

["_…thank you…_"]

He sits outside the ICU on one of the many waiting chairs. Watching a woman he should remember kneel a meter away and let out painful, retching sobs.

Witnessing her world drop apart fracture by fracture until all she had left were the pieces left behind.

Seconds and minutes pass - Katsuki takes that vulnerability and puts labels on it; sadness, fear, worry.

He feels none of that.

Only a frozen dispassion.

A wall between himself and humanity drops.

Katsuki can hear the iron bars slam into the ground. Down and down into the earth they spike. Separating him from a world resolved to emotions he can't touch.

A world he could destroy if he bothered.

Shutting his eyes, he mutters:

"Man this is tedious."

And doesn't dwell on it ever again.

…

Katsuki kind of turned Deku into katsudon.

Two officers, one foetus and the other cat faced, question him about the explosion. Gently steering him towards the quiet Hospital cafeteria.

His father isn't smiling.

Katsuki's beginning to think he's standing in a load of crap and forgot to wear his boots.

He turns prostate.

Thinking – reflecting - that turning Deku into katsudon really was poor decision making on his part. He internally sweats a bit at the thought of the police barring his hero career from kicking off because of it.

He internally giggles.

Everything about _that_ sucked.

Maybe he should apologise when Deku's stopped dying in the other room.

[ Behind, a whimper cracks:

_"What happened to my baby, Mitisuki?"_

_"Katsuki…he…" ]_

The human looking one offers his hand as they sit. Katsuki shakes it - measuring the newfound -

[_familiar]_

\- strength so as to not pluck the man's hand off like a mock prosthetic.

Before Katsuki knows it the man's speaking again and he ends up missing the first half of the sentence.

" – told your parents it was self-defence, so you'll be let off with a warning for underage use of your quirk," Neko says. _Quirk? _"Although, as you caused critical harm to your friend along with property damage, you will have to do community service at your local animal shelter and aid with the clean up crew."

"It could have been a lot worse, Bakugō-san," foetus guy interjects.

"I understand," his father says.

What did he just understand?

"I'm glad."

_Wha…?_

"On that note," foetus guy continues. Pinning Katsuki with a smile that could tame a wild boar. "I would like to question you about the circumstances that lead up to the explosion."

"You don't have to," his father says. Sudden hand gripping his and -

Katsuki could barely feel it.

The touch was far too soft and far too gentle for him to.

"Nobody's forcing you."

Katsuki cocks his head.

Expression blank as the sun's shadow.

"He's right," the man agrees. Not put out, "but if you don't mind –"

"I don't mind," Saitama clears.

The officers share quick glances.

His father sighs, looking elsewhere. Eyes vexed and solemn.

"Right," Neko says, "then if you will…"

So Katsuki calmly recounts his exchange with the sludge guy up to the moment where he evaporated the thing. Keeping out useless details of acquiring a second set of memories.

"What we've been told by witnesses," foetus says, finger tapping the table, "is that the sludge villain appeared to leave peacefully."

"Yeah, he did."

"…I see," the man says, smile fainter and carrying on with official pleasantries. "Thank you for your time, Bakugō-san."

Good. Now he can go home.

…

His father is sad, and Katsuki doesn't know why.

He isn't the one on the operating table.

…

Sun down, moon up - Katsuki slips out his bedroom window and leaps into the sky.

Bounding across town with no clear direction.

For the next week Heroes track suspicious craters left in roads, backyards and alleyways like breadcrumbs.

[_all they see _

_captured in black and white CCTV footage _

_is a yellow blur_]

He was as powerful as ever.

And that was that.

…

When Katsuki apologises to Deku's mother, the woman hugs him.

She spreads her arms wide and pulls him in. Holding him close as she cries in easy forgiveness.

Kastuki's head dampens and it's gross but he hugs her until she stops.

"You're a good boy," she tells him. "You're a good boy."

…

He feels no excitement or anger towards this world. No hope for a better tomorrow.

No purpose. No anticipation.

It's -

\- _exhausting_.

He slips into boredom like a man on his deathbed. Curls into a tomb of darkness, content.

Katsuki is Saitama.

End of chapter, turn page, move onwards and upwards.

[_To the moon and back again_]

…

The animal shelter is full of cats.

They pounce, meow, and scratch at Katsuki's clothing like sirens drawing men to their death.

Often, Katsuki gets a rush of anger – _foreign, familiar_ – and almost punches the small felines. Spray their broken carcasses across the room like a bottle of dropped cranberry juice.

Watch them explode in his palms.

He doesn't.

[_cats liked Genos_

_liked his warmth the machines generated_

_Liked the rhythmic hum of his insides_]

Those feelings wither.

Like a spitting light bulb giving into sleep.

He resolves to changing their litter, feeding them, keeping them comfortable.

Rinse and repeat.

…

Connected to the shelter is a café where adoption is promoted. Sometimes when staff is low and customers build, Katsuki is handed an apron and sent to take orders.

He's become quite the busy person.

…

Deku is trussed in bandages that stain yellow from pus. He can't talk. Doesn't know Katsuki's there.

Deku is in a coma.

Katsuki thinks he should feel something.

Maybe guilt.

For the entire weekend, he stays sitting in the bedside chair with a manga - glancing at Deku periodically. Listening to machines _bleep_ and _boop _in a ceaseless, dull mantra.

Waiting to feel.

To see if he still could.

Five days pass.

Deku's pain never quite delivers.

[_he should be disappointed, yes?_]

…

All Might keeps him from loosing it.

Just knowing that maybe, some day, if he ever went toe-to-toe against the Pro Hero he might get defeated.

It was the only thing that saves him from ending it all.

…

" – _month since the_ _tragedy where heroes failed to respond appropriately. Resulting in the unnamed fourteen year old to take matters into his own hands and k_– "

"Fucking pissing me off."

Reclined on the sofa, Katsuki flips the page of his manga. Oblivious to his mother switching off the tv set in the other room.

A month has passed since he acquired power that could split skies like a knife, crack earth like a mallet.

He remembers a cyborg he often turned to, from boredom, entertainment, fondness - sentiment, if he were feeling particularly adventurous.

[_a cyborg now specks of dust suspended mid-air_]

Time carries.

School, community service, manga, training, visiting Deku…

Life is dull, senseless, timeless.

…

Days merge together like spilt paint.

...

The shelter is run by a retired pro hero who resembles an albino feline. Ears, tail, whiskers, dopy attitude….

Katsuki wonders if she smokes catnip.

He asks.

She firmly denies it while handing him a roll up of weed.

Ah, he understands.

For novelty's sake he accepts and spends break time in her office lighting it up.

Smoke rolls inside his lungs, trapped in a delirium of toxication before he exhales. Releasing it all in one go.

Five minutes pass.

He feels nothing.

"Shit kid," she smacks his arm. Red eyes glazed. "You've got a pair of steely fuckin' balls."

…

Every night Katsuki sits on the moon. Watching earth's rotation.

Breathless.

Lungs threatening to burst like a compressed balloon.

[_vulnerable_]

…

Once a week Katsuki tries to visit Deku in the hospital. To '_take responsibility' _his mother said.

Deku is a pot plant.

Lacks the entertainment value his manga holds.

All he does is _sleep_.

It makes time spent in the private hospital room silent. Almost tranquil.

Away from hawk-eyed, sassy parents.

Then one day he walks in to find a man who resembles a chopstick with a wig stapled on sitting in the bedside chair.

Katsuki doesn't remember him.

He doesn't remember a lot of people these days.

"Who are you supposed to be?"

The man startles and chokes blood.

_Hel-lo?_

…


	3. Chapter Two

...

Chapter Two

...

A little dye pinched grey from the man's blonde hair - stringy, hanging in his face - smelling of burnt coffee and overcooked bacon. He stood in the corner of Deku's hospital room. Dabbing blood off his chin. Gathering his breath like an old car engine for a few minutes.

[_Not ringing any bells - Katsuki goes back to his manga]_

Eyeing him - lounged in the only bedside chair -the man coughs into a fist.

"Cancer treatment isn't in this shitty hospital block," Katsuki points his finger in the general direction of the door.

"Ah. Oh."

"Yeah, well," Katsuki doesn't look up as he wiggles his fingers '_buh by_e'.

There's a long pause then the faint sound of feet shuffling.

The door clicks open and shut.

"You're fucking welcome," Katsuki mutters to himself.

Katsuki forgets about the man like goldfish forgets about the ocean.

.

From that moment to this moment, Katsuki looks up at the ceiling of the classroom on his second day back at school and thinks about nothing in particular.

He stands in the back of the basketball court during P.E, staring up at the nets.

He keeps an ear out for All-Might on mornings people have their breakfasts, and nights spent with lovers.

Bounding through the sky and clouds and cities - always arriving seconds after the 'strongest man alive' finishes with villains squishier than roasted marshmallows.

Always one lousy second.

Katsuki's toes curl in his sneakers, and with one mighty _push_ he shoots above a storm cloud pulsating with electric currents ready to crack and spit and _tear_ into the atmosphere.

.

In the old black suit of his father's, Katsuki flaps his arms like a scarecrow. His mother whacks his shoulder. A camera shutters. He's handed a certificate.

_Scht scht scht scht scht_

It was graduation day, and Katsuki had passed by the skin of his teeth.

He says as such to Deku. No longer wrapped up like a horror film.

Patches of white, shiny scars tore his freckled skin this way and that - as though he had stood too close to a burst pipe of acid.

In fact, it didn't look horrendous at all.

Not one bit.

It irked him.

[_because if it was bad - if Deku looked so mutilated, so yellow with puss and deformed that even his mother couldn't look at him too long without bursting into tears and making him want to kill himself - _

_Then -_

_Maybe then - _

_Maybe then…_

_Maybe._

_tch._]

"There's this school I'm going to, U -" Katsuki pauses to uselessly fill the bedside jug of flowers with water from his bottle, " - Q, or something dummer than that. I don't know."

.

Being holidays, Katsuki is given more shifts at the Cat Cafe before he can argue about being busy. He place has expanded into a larger franchise recently and Katsuki spots more faces among the staff while clearing out the kitty litter.

One evening as albino granny lights the roll up of catnip in her office - her smile of content smoothing back the crinkles on her face- he asks what it's all about.

"They're like you," she breathes smoke, reclining back into her cushioned desk chair and arches a white eyebrow. "Juvenile youth working off community service."

"Ah," Katsuki nods, taking the cigarette without much thought. It doesn't do anything to him, no high no nothing.

still, it was a nice routine they had going on and Katsuki didn't want to ruin it.

So he inhales the murkey smoke and swishes it around in his lungs.

"This is your's innit?" Granny taps a wallet on her desk Katsuki only just noticed was there. Right next to a ball of yarn and awfully knitted sweater. "Manager Kim noticed the new recruit pick-pocketing you. Silly girl. Tch."

"Oh," Katsuki gives his wallet a once over, realising he never truly looked at it before. He just carries it around with him, never giving too much thought or notice - isn't that odd -

[_stained brown leather_

_Edges singed_

_In black marker, written expertly on the back with knowledge and ownership _

爆豪勝己

_His name_

_It's like he's holding another person's wallet_]

\- before pocketing it. "That's kind."

"Hmph, thank her next time you see her."

He shrugs, not knowing who this Kim person is. "Sure."

.

Katsuki isn't lying when he says he's busy.

He's busy right now, squatted on the roof of a skyscraper next to its antenna, scratching his back and waiting for a monster to appear.

[_wantonly]_

The city of Japan stretched before him resembles an oil painting. Smooth and perfect lines, crisp edges, sharp colours, rainbow hues twinkling behind it as it slowly, sleepily, sets.

Perfect for disaster to strike.

And he hears it. Sirens. Shouts. explosions.

Katsuki rises and tips off the edge like one would do into a pool.

Lying flat in mid-air, he kicks off against the scraper, pining in the direction of chaos like a hockey puck.

All Might appears wherever trouble goes. So therefore, he should do the same.

.

Only All Might doesn't show, another hero does.

And gets his head nocked clean off his shoulders for it.

Katsuki watches it roll unsteadily towards his feet (circumference clearly not made for this type of mobility) from where he stood - at the foot of a staircase leading down to an underground casino.

It's not all sunshine and rainbows today.

No sir.

People are rushing and collapsing past him in haste.

They're wild. In a frenzy. The kind people are when a monster appears and starts killing.

Clothes bloody, body parts missing.

The man's blue eyes, frozen in shock and horror, stare up at him.

Sometimes, Katsuki has to ask God why he created humanity.

For no real reason other than not wanting to witness a head get kicked around like a ripe plum- Katsuki hoofs it under an arm and pushes his way into the rudimentary casino.

Down a carpeted hallway, Katsuki passes the body that belongs to the head he holds and steps into a low lit room where a girl in a suit and mask is currently viciously attacking a guy.

She doesn't notice his presence.

The man does. His bloodied eyes gaze at him, he blubbers something. Katsuki puts a finger to his lips and '_shh's_.

He steps to the side, crouches in the corner and waits.

And waits.

Still.

All Might doesn't show.

He can hear police outside and the girl has killed herself with her quirk and oh, All Might hasn't appeared.

Another bust.

He stands, and leaps.

_Up_.

The floorboards burst, the roof, earth, cement - it all bursts open as Katsuki shoots through like a a human torpedo - bounding his way across the city for the next monster.

.

He leaves the head of course.

[_About a quarter mile away at a different villain location_]

.

In the middle of cases on mundane human escapades full of drunks and insane people doing insane things, between faculty responsibilities and Hizashi bothering him, Aizawa likes to check in on the villain vs hero world.

Peek in to see if everything is exactly how he left it.

It wasn't.

Blue Liberty, old graduate of UA, decapitated.

Criminal committed suicide.

Death Casualties: 7

Civilians injured: 9

Aizawa scrolls through online police files and flips through news channels, scrubbing his chin and dropping back on his couch.

He listens to the police scanner _schhtz_ and _jeeetz_ as they begin their frantic search for Blue Liberty's runaway head.

Aizawa can hear reporters and journalists keyboards clicking away their judgements and criticism, mocking and curses at their Hero community.

He sighs.

What a shit show.

.

Rain is falling when Deku wakes up.

Consciousness had run down Deku's veins like an unclogged drainpipe. Shone through the haze of whatever had put Deku asleep in the first place and made him a living vegetable. He's photosynthesised and ready for action he tells them.

"Lie the fuck down, Brat," Katsuki flicks Deku on the forehead. Properly slamming him back down into bed.

"Katsuki," his father sighs and guides him to the back of the room by his arm.

[_"Was tha..Kachaan?"_]

And "What?," Katsuki asks his father, "he looks like he could barely survive a gentle breeze."

"Your solution is to flick him on the forehead? He just woke up from a _ten month coma_."

"What of it?"

His father simply looks to the ceiling in prayer.

Deku's mother is talking to the doctor who is talking to Deku and Katsuki watches the clock on the wall tick by five seconds before he has to excuse himself out of pure boredom.

It's six forty five at night, and Katsuk thinks it's swell Deku's no longer dead in the head, but would he rather be watching villains kill other people in wait for All Might would show up and be rid of this monotony? Oh, yeah.

[_You betcha] _

Sitting in the chair outside Deku's room, slamming his head repeatedly against the wall in measured strength so he wouldn't bring the entire building down, Katsuki hear's news from the nurses desk of a local disturbance.

Katsku's father comes outside to check on him five minutes later - only to find son soaked to the bone.

All Might was a bust.

Again.

.

Please review and let me know what you think (:


	4. Chapter Three

yo, dearies!

hope you're all staying safe and washing your hands 3

Enjoy :D

...

Chapter three

...

Katsuki thinks his quirk is a broken butterfly - as though he had teared it in half and pinned it up on the wall with a seperate species.

Since the day he was born, the first heartbeat in the womb and intake of oxygen, blood runs hot and thick like gasoline.

But it's tempered now.

He doesn't fluster and puff like a blistering explosion.

The first time he uses his quirk after the incident is when somebody at work mentions it. Some people he was catering to because they happened to be low on staff at the cafe that day -

["_Hey, aren't you that kid in the news a couple months back?"_

"_Yeah yeah didn't you blow that villain up?"_]

and Katsuki goes, "_ah_" at the tick of his brain.

He takes their orders, delivers it, and meets Granny in her office at break-time for the usual shared joint.

He intercepts her lighter with his finger. Bead of nitroglycerin sweat sparking the paper bud red.

Leaning back, satisfaction burns then dies like a baby flame starved of oxygen.

.

"Hey," Granny starts then stops. Relishing the swish of smoke in her lungs before slowly exhaling a heady cloud. "Your contract ends next week."

Katsuki takes the offered cigarette. Rolling it between his fingers, "I didn't know that."

She snorts, "Figured. Your parole officer sent you a text you probably deleted or ignored."

"I lost my phone a while ago," Katsuki confesses.

He has an idea of where it might be. Abandoned between crime scenes. Probably fell out of his pocket mid-leap. Either broken, dead or miraculously alive. Stolen and already sold to some backstreet thug.

"What you doing, kid. Get it together."

His nod causes her to sigh.

"Smoke," she orders and he does. Inhaling and exhaling a couple times before giving it back. "You're at UA next week."

"I am."

"Prepared for it? The Ezam is fucked up in so many degrees they could turn it into a modern-day compass."

Katsuki lifts his head. "I hope so."

"You better be or I'll come visit you in hospital."

Katsuki can't fathom the imagery of that, "Hell."

Granny cackles. "Don't fuck it up."

"I don't plan on it, shitty hag."

She cackles some more and slowly, easily she keeps on talking. About what, Katsuki shrugs.

"Gonna miss your ugly mug around here, that brat who stole your wallet hasn't shown up these past couple weeks. Lazy girl. Whatever trouble she's found herself in it's her own damn fault, that's what I tell you."

"Yeah, yeah."

.

Deku is back from physical therapy when Katsuki visits next.

The guy is panting in his bed and grinning ear to ear like a lunatic. He chuckles, brighter than the sun when Katsuki walks in.

"Kaachan! Is that a cactus?"

"Aloe vera, it's a succulent," Katsuki corrects. Handing it to Deku who holds the miniature pot plant like it was the first gift he's received in his entire sixteen years. "You can cut the leaves and use the extract for burns."

"This was your idea?" Deku asks.

Eyes big as the moon in full glory.

"Bitch," he seats himself on the visitor's chair. "Don't cry."

"I'm not crying!"

"Uh huh," Katsuki grabs a tissue and hands it to Deku. The guy hesitates before accepting and quickly wipes the little wet globs away. "It's just a plant."

"I'm not crying about the damn plant, Kaachan," Deku cradles it in his lap. Staring at it as though it held every memory, every feeling he could ever hope for. "I'm crying because I'm happy."

"…What?"

"Never mind," Deku chuckles. Smile returning.

Katsuki's eyes trace the thin blotches of pink, grey scars splattered on his face like ink stains. Follows it down his neck then under the dressing gown's collar.

"Your hair's growing," he observes stupidly.

A bit self-conscious, Deku scrubs his head. Kept shaved for surgery, burns and other supposedly important procedures Katsuki half-heard about but forgot. Little tuffs of earth green was sprouting.

"You look like freshly mowed lawn."

Cheeks pink Deku splutters, "H-Hey…"

Katsuki shrugs, "I say it how it is."

The door opens.

"Ooh. Heh." A man mutters.

Katsukii notices the toothpick blonde man, stuttering lamely in the doorway, brain clocking. "Do I know you, asshole?"

"Kaachan!" Deku goggles. "I'm sorry, Yagi-san!"

"Huh heh, it's quite alright Midiroya-kun."

"You know this guy, Deku?"

"We've, uh, met earlier, young man."

Katsuki takes in the sight of the anorexic guy drowning in his clothes. Sickly pallor of skin pulled around his skull like straining cling wrap.

Giving out the air of a flat tire.

"You sure?" He cautions.

"You directed me towards the cancer clinic, which turned out to be the mortuary." Yagi helps. "Innocent mistake."

"Yes," Katsuki feigns acknowledgement for the sake of not looking dumb. "Yeah. Hi, how's cancer?"

"Young man, I don't have cancer."

"Good for you."

Deku forces a laugh.

.

Deku's new friend is weird and probably inching towards his grave with every hackle and wet cough.

.

It's rainfall when Katsuki arrives at the police station with his father.

Clouds hang low. Glowing in evening sunshine drizzle.

City loud and splashing.

Raindrops _pitter patter_ on the plastic umbrella.

His socks are wet.

A Detective had called about his missing phone.

Eventually they are seated opposite the police officer at his desk. Phone sealed in an evidence bag and placed before them. The once wet blood that had covered it is now crusted and blackened.

"We found it at a villain's recent crime scene. It was in possession of one of the victims at the time. Do either of you recognise this woman?" The man was plain faced and soft spoken. Easily forgettable.

He shows a picture of some lady.

_"Nup."_

His blonde hair is dripping droplets onto the desk and katsuki combes it back with a hand.

It bounces back and sprays the side of his father's face along with the Detective's.

They stare.

"…Er, sorry. I lost my phone a while back," he scratches his head. Dampness causing strings of pointy clumps to itch and poke like a nest of twigs.

"And you never bothered to make a report?" Detective…Katsuki glances at the name plate, Tsukauchi inquires.

"Didn't feel like making a fuss about something trivial."

_["Trivial?" His father echoes.]_

Tsukauchi nods, "I see then. Well, you're welcome to having it back. I'm sorry about the mess in advance."

[_"You…won't clean it?"]_

"Hey thanks, man," Katsuki grabs the bag and opens it to check unread messages. Confirming what Granny told him earlier about his parole officer.

"Are you certain you've never seen this girl?" Tsukauchi asks once more before they leave.

The picture is an old mugshot of a girl with dark tangled hair. She was plain as a sheet of paper. Another easily forgettable face in the world.

"Cocksure."

.

The day of the Exam into UA his train gets derailed by some random villain.

The guy comes crashing in somewhere at high speed. Sweeping through and blowing up a compartment.

Wheels upturn and the compartment Katsuki's in sails off into a nearby street. Exploding through decorative shrubs and unearthing asphalt like a lonely comet.

He's standing and holding onto the overhead handrail, fresh as a daisy as it comes to a grinding halt just outside a wedding shop.

Commuters around him claw desperately through broken windows.

Disgruntled, harrowed and outrageous mutterings about the inconvenience.

Katsuki helps most to safety before hopping out. Landing on a patch of pavement spatted with broken glass and fragments of the carriages' outer-structure.

The catastrophe of the disassembled train track resembled a trodden centipede. In the distance beyond it, Katsuki spotted two outlined figured exchanging blows.

"Damned villains," some elderly man muttered besides him. He was leaning on his knees and growing at the world. "_Damned_ villains. Wasn't like this in my day, I'll tell you."

Katsuki agrees.

"Monsters," he says, aggrieved he was going to be late.

The old man grunts. Choosing to sit.

Whipping out his phone he powers on the GPS, types in '_UA_' and high-tails it. Passing harried police officers, firemen and paramedics as he went.

.

The school security guard rushes him into the lecture hall. He is ten minutes late. A

"You're doomed," she tells him in parting outside big metal doors.

Katsuki enters.

The door, not made for gentle openings, swings open at light-speed. Carrying the approximate weight of a small truck.

_THWACKBANG_

It senses Katsuki move a safe distance away.

And slams back shut_._

The room, doused in darkness, crowd of hero-wanna-be's encircling a tiny pinecone headed man in floodlight, is silent.

"LATE!" The man in floodlight shouts. Voice so loud it was as though he were standing a centimetre away with a megaphone - attached to a second megaphone only much larger.

Katsuki scoffs. "My shitty train got derailed by a creepy-ass, motherfucking, hero-hating bitchy villain," he explains all very easily. "Sorry I'm late by a handful of arse-kicking minutes."

A bespectacled kid bit through his wooden pencil.

Eventually, blondie decides, "GOOD ENOUGH!"

"Can I sit or what?"

"ABSOLUTELY - AND FOR THE LOVE OF EVERYTHING WATCH YOUR LANGUAGE! _Jeezuz_."

"It's been a fucking pleasure," Katsuki mutters to himself and settles for a random spare seat someone awkwardly waves him towards.

"RH-RHIGHT-O LISTENERS! BACK TO IT!"

.

When they're directed to change into active gear, Katsuki comes to the realisation he left his backpack on the train.

"Yeah…" Katsuki stares at the patient, strained smile of pinecone man as he explains in the empty lecture hall. "Can I still take the test?"

"OOOOH ER, IN _THAT_?" The man hazards. Gesturing at him.

True, he doesn't look remarkable or intimidating in jeans, a plain red t-shirt and black duffer. True, he looked like a wussy with the mittens his father had knitted him hanging loosely around his neck. Katsuki discretely pockets them.

He nods.

"ERR…" pinecone's eyes fluster around in a considerable unintelligent way, "DON'T YOU HAVE ANY GADGETS OR AIDING -"

"Heck. Clothes don't make the hero you know, that's prejudice."

"OH," Pinecone's voice flutters awkwardly. Abashed. "TOTALLY."

"By the way," Katsuki keeps the man from leaving after a long, thoughtful pause, "I was meaning to ask…"

"YE_H_S?"

"Is there any sort of reward for the hero with the most points?"

The man blinks. "YOU KNOW, LISTENER," he concludes, wiping his palm across his forehead. "YOU'RE THE FIRST TO ASK."

Katsuki looks at the midget seriously. Red eyes sparking with something that may or may not have been greed.

_[without a doubt it was]_

"That so?"

"_NOTHING OF THE SORT GOES ON HERE_. WHAT KIND OF ESTABLISHMENT DO YOU THINK WE'RE RUNNING, LISTENER?!"

Katsuki mutters a vague, unsatisfactory answer.

"I _SAY!"_

.

Lone amongst the assembly of chattering tracksuit students, Katsuki gazes up at a wrought iron gate and beyond -behind, inside, stood an intrinsic replica of a small city. Reaching skyscrapers, stumpy buildings and a few letterboxes protruded as though they were the real deal.

It was very neat.

"You're arrogance succeeds you," a voice says - tone amounting to a certain level of haughtiness Katsuki is briefly convinced belonged to that green brat Tatsumaki.

Only the voice was male.

"Tardiness aside."

Katsuki follows the voice to a tall, muscly bespectacled teenager. Eyebrows serious.

The very one who bit into his pencil.

"You seem to not be taking this test seriously, which is an insult to myself and others," the kid eyes him hard. "Conduct yourself accordingly and with respect to your peers, slacker. Change immediately!"

"Don't talk rubbish about what you don't know."

"_Don't get cocky you_ -!"

"Yeah, yeah," Katsuki turns and walks away from the stuffy air. Hand flapping.

On top of an erected podium, the pinecone man pops into view and stomps a foot that manages to silence all chatter.

"AAAAAND _START_!"

.

Katsuki wanders about the streets lamely in search for a robot. The second after "START" he had shot into the mocked city (unintentionally missing the action of Robot number one) and never looked back.

"Hello?" He calls. Nothing even remotely threatening attempted to approach him.

Trudging onwards, a distant explosion has him pinging in its direction like a honeybee on speed.

He finds himself in a destroyed playground and the remains of a robot with its head flung off by what appeared to be a well-aimed glacier.

The sound of a building collapse has him redirecting and pinging again.

This goes on for some time and the effect on Katsuki is immediate. Frustration was building like an internal rash. His pores were spitting little sparks.

He ravaged through streets in angry gestures like a man possessed.

Turning a street corner that housed a fake shrub, one gigantic robot pops out of a nearby bakery. Silver metal gleamed in rays of sunshine and pinged and ponged as debris flew about. Shaking the earth with each step it took, Katsuki figured it to be at least six stories high. Eventually it got so close its heavy figure shadowed him.

He was impressed.

"ah ha!" Katsuki shouts in glee. At last.

Suddenly a fast approaching figure was advancing from behind the robot.

_Don't you dare, _he thought.

In a flash Katsuki is in the air and torpedoing straight through the robot. Metal groans and gears spray in scattering of confetti.

_clang_

The Robot drops in a heap.

Grinning like a lunatic at the point finally earned, his eyes meet the obsolete mismatched ones of his opponent. The guy was half ginger and half white.

"Is that like, genetic or a fashion statement?"

The guy huffs and dashes in an odd direction.

.

"How'd it go?" Izuku asks when Katsuki visits him afterwards. He was thrumming in his bed, eyes sparkling.

"Keh," he drops into the bedside seat. Dust congested on his duffer making a little cloud. "It was boring after my first win."

Izuki freezes, "What?"

"There was this pinecone headed dude who was really loud. His hair kind of reminded me of a banana now that I think about it…" he mumbles, mind drifting off to snacks and absently glancing through Izuku's growing manga collection stacked in piles on the floor.

"How was it boring?" Izuku demands. Grasping the air. "It's _UA._ I heard there were robots and a fake city and _explosions_. You must have gone to the wrong place."

"Brat," Katsuki looks up. "There were robots, and they were lame. For the first quarter they really had me there with the evading," he admits with slight embarrassment, "but I got them all in the end."

Izuku, already slightly discouraged, and hearing that he was thoroughly put out. Biting his lip he stumbles on a snort.

"Only you would find UA's entrance exam disappointing, Kaachan."

"Where did you hear about the robots?" Katsuki asks, choosing a romantic manga and flipping through. "They made me sign a confidentiality agreement at the end to not talk about it." He glances up over a page.

Izuki is halfway through a stuttering answer when Katsuki brushes it off.

"tch."

.

Please review(:


	5. Chapter Five

...

Chapter Four

...

Katsuki goes to bed reading a manga at ten and wakens at sunrise with its pages plastered to his cheek. Saliva crusted around his mouth like bits of sand. He gets up, stretches, walks down the flight of stairs to the front door, kicks on his sandals and rummages through the mailbox at the border of his house.

Crisp morning air puffs in his face.

He spots the next door neighbour walking outside in their thick wool dressing gown and fur slippers. They wave at him. Katsuki raises his bare arm in a vague gesture. He notices one envelope in particular.

[_This is sort of bullshit, Katsuki thinks_.]

Walking back inside, eyes skyward. Peering through red Japanese maple leaves to the pastel mist sky.

Golden rays dripped off his brick roof and down cement walls like water.

[_The type of bullshit that he's gotten so used to and can't do anything about._

_The type of bullshit that's no longer bullshit_

_Just regular, everyday bullshit]_

.

He sat in the hospital room's visitor chair munching on a banana as Deku held the envelope in trembling hands.

"You, you want _me_ to open it?" Deku asked. "_Me_?"

It was a weekend. From seven tomorrow morning, all across Japan semester will start back up - this letter decided which school he'll attend.

Or attend one at all.

"Go on," Katsuki kicked the edge of Deku's cot. Jutting his chin. "Open it."

"You are so kidding me!" Deku boggled. "You've been wanting to go to this school since we were kids and it's all you've ever talked about aside from becoming the number one hero - this school being your origin story or whatever are you really sure you want me to open - "

"Want me to come back later shithead?" Kastuki asked positively.

"No no I'll open it!" Deku gingerly tore off the candle wax seal so it would stay in one piece then tipped it upside down. Out fell a metal chip onto Deku's lap.

Deku peeked back into the envelope.

"That it?" Katsuki asked.

Deku blinked at him, double-checked the envelope and looked at him. "Yeah." He said.

Katsuki poked the little circular chip and squinted when spat out a humongous grinning hologram.

'_Bakugou Katsuki_!' All Might pointed at Deku.

Katsuki abstractly munched on his banana.

'_This is All Might, new resident teacher at UA_.'

"All Might!?" Deku shrieked. "_Teacher_?!"

'_You rated 99 out of two hundred on the written portion of the exam, but made up with it on the practical. The sheer grit and will of you young man shined through in the end. Skill rating coming in second place amongst your peers. Come on down Bakugou Katsuki, to UA class 1A!_'

The hologram swooped back into the little chip which promptly spat a spark and died.

"Huh," said Katsuki. Peering at the broken piece of metal and poking it. "Was that supposed to happen?"

"You're going to UA," Deku raised his hands and planted them on both of Katsuki's shoulders. "Kachaan, _you're going to UA_." There was a certain moment where Deku stared into Katsuki's eyes, willing him to absorb the full weight of his words. "_All Might will be your teacher."_

_"_All Might," Katsuki's face could have been carved out of ice. "Fucking _yes_."

"That's the spirit!" Deku encouraged, grin creasing the scar tissue under his jawline. "Aaah, I'm so jealous."

"You'll join me after you recover," Katasuki said - and it visibly stunned Deku. It was a statement, not a possibility. Not a maybe. Katsuki was certain of it. He believed in Deku, and Deku had to swallow his emotions cause he knew how much they made Katsuki uncomfortable. "You said you were going, didn't you?"

"That -" Deku gibbered. " - was before - "

"Fuck before. Were you serious about becoming a hero or were you being shitty and playing make believe like a kid?"

"You know I wasn't!" Deku shouted before he could help himself.

"There you go then," Katsuki said simply and picked up the chip and placed it on Deku's nightstand. "Keep it until you get your own."

Quickly Deku wiped away his brimming tears and said, in a wobbly voice, "Thank you, Kachaan."

.

Trains were out of service from the villain attack, a regular occurrence, leaving his father to drive him to school. Half an hour of news reports come through speakers. Weather reports, muggings, assaults, heroic acts - Katsuki doesn't hear anything on All Might making him wonder whether the man is already at the school.

Thoughts pop into his head, questions to ask the man - one clearer than the others.

.

Some minutes after his father dropped him off at school, Katsuki came to the embarrassing conclusion that he is lost. Around him students of various ages and unique appearance bustled in excitement.

They chittered like birds on a tree branch. Loud. Annoying. He'd done his fair time at school and wasn't about to take any gruff from it.

Katsuki resolved in search for a map. An establishment of this proportion must have one.

He wandered through the futuristic hallways with glass walls and metal doors. Reflecting him in his green and grey uniform.

A bell chimed, students disappear like cockroaches retreating from sunlight and Katsuki ended up in a garden of some sort. Meandering through shrubs of flowers, across a small patch of lawn with a fountain to a seperate building. Katsuki stood at the foot of it and looked up.

"Son of a bitch. Where am I?" He asked.

A hand fell on his shoulder followed by a feral growl. Katsuki cranked his head up to see a wild-looking man in a muzzle and wearing what looked to be a skinned bear on his chest.

The man's eyes sparkled homicidal intent.

"Oi, _pup_."

"Hey…" Katsuki muttered. Unable to look away from that contraption on his face. Vaguely wondering if he was a threat or not.

"It's past eight, shouldn't you be in class?" Those pinpoint eyes narrowed, "Or are you skipping like some punk?"

Ah, a bodyguard.

"Here," Katsuki fished in his pocket for his class schedule which, at the top right hand corner, had his class and teacher listed. He handed it to the rough man.

"Do you know," Said Katsuki, "that you've got a muzzle on?"

The man grunted his awareness. "Bakugou Katsuki…Class 1A, assigned to Aizawa-sensei," the wolf man put his hand onto of Katsuki's head and manually turned him around. "You're at the wrong building, pup. Follow."

Katsuki followed. "Hey, Wolfy, is All Might here?"

The huge man whipped around. "You will refer to me as Hound Dog," he growled.

"Eeer," Katsuki stared at the saliva dribbling through his muzzle, "Whatever. Ok."

One last growl, Hound Man ushered them quicker across the lawn, rose bushes, hallways, up a flight of staircase until they arrived at a huge door with '1A' painted on it in green.

Hound Dog shoved the door open.

"Oi, Aizawa - "

The classroom was empty.

Both stood in the doorway. Katsuki blinked up at the guy. Getting suspicious.

"Errmmmm, you sure you took me to the right place, Wolfy - "

"It's Hound Dog," the man grumbled a deep guttural growl. "And yes. I'm sure. Follow."

Again Katsuki followed after the larger man. His steps thundering and chest rumbling. Katsuki had to work double time to stay in step.

They made it to an open lawn behind the two buildings that appeared to be a sports field. In the centre were exhausted looking students in a blue spots uniform behind a mummified man.

"Oi!" Hound Dog howled and waved, "Aizawa! Found one of your runts." He poked a thumb in gesture

"Bakugou Katsuki, I assume," Aizawa said in a considerable drawl. "You're late."

Not knowing what to say to that, Katsuki shrugged. Observing the panting, flushed peers of his.

One of them straightened and aimed a finger, "You!" The bespectacled guy gasped in-between words. "Again! Incredible!"

It took a second to process that, "Do I know you?" He hazarded.

Before anything could turn into something, Aizawa made a shushing gesture and waved off Hound Dog in thanks.

"Right, everyone change back into your uniform and enjoy recess. If you need to visit the infirmary, do so. Bakugou, stay back while I talk to Mineta."

Intent on not standing any longer, Katsuki plopped down, unzipped his backpack and cracked open a manga. One he had picked from Deku's pile.

.

"Do you want to be a hero?"

Katsuki peered over his manga to Aizawa."Yeah."

"The Hero Department doesn't tolerate tardiness. Having an unreliable student who half-asses lessons like you isn't what we want here, okay?"

"Okay."

Aizawa peered at him for a long moment before nodding. "Put that away," he gestured to the manga, "You'll be spending your recess with me performing a quirk apprehension test. If you don't meet UA's requirements, you will be expelled. Are we clear?"

"Shouldn't I get changed?" Katsuki asked. Recalling his peers were in their sport uniform.

"No time for that," Aizawa presented him with a ball, "take off your blazer and tie. You have to throw this with all your might."

Katsuki did as said, rolled up his sleeves took the ball - aimed, and threw.

There was a gust, an explosion and he watched as the ball soared through the atmosphere at light speed.

"Your rational metric distance," said Aizawa. He showed the little devices' screen in his hand; a horizontal 8. "Quite the quirk you have. Have you been doing any intensive training recently? The physical you had last year didn't measure this sort of growth."

Katsuki shrugged, "No." He said, staring at the clouds and oblivious to the silent watchfulness of his teacher. He hoped the ball didn't hit a planet because that could end badly and he didn't want it marring his reputation. Planet destroyer, that didn't have a good ring to it.

"Next," Aizawa clipped.

.

Come end of recess, Katsuki found a seat in the back of the classroom and spent the lesson trying to focus to whatever the teacher was talking about. Maths? Science? It was important, the girl in the seat next to him was taking notes. Pen moving in ceaseless melodic notes. Her hair - long as her body was tied up into an inky ponytail. Katsuki thinks it's the softest hair he's ever seen. He could see the afternoon sun streaming through the windows getting sucked into its depths.

He turned back to Aizawa, reattempting to listen.

Again, it was _important_. The glasses boy in the front row responded to a question and got it right. Maybe he should have a chat to the kid during lunch, Katsuki thought. Get his notes. He looked like he could _explain_ things well.

The boy seemed to sense his watchfulness and turned in his seat to glance at him. Katsuki leaned forward and attempted a charming smile.

The boy seemed to grit his teeth.

Katsuki re-attempted listening and before he knew it the lunch bell rang and everyone was putting away their pens and notebooks. Having nothing to put away himself, he brought himself to the glasses kid and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Hey," Katsuki smiled and again, the boy stared at him gritting his teeth.

"What do you want?"

"I didn't _get_ what Aizawa-sensei was dragging on about, did you?"

Glasses stared at him. Not blinking. "You didn't understand sensei explaining the basics of crowd control?"

"Hey, that's what it was?"

Glasses nodded then shook his head. "You got into 1A with this level of ignorance. I must say, this is a modern-day mystery."

"Right," Katsuki said. Blundering on, "I was wondering, listen, why don't you and I be study buddies?"

This didn't inspire the exact level of interest as Katsuki hoped it would.

"That's got to be the most horrible idea I've ever - hold a minute," Glasses brought a finger to his lips and appeared to be in deep thought somewhere. Katsuki waited a minute and turned to leave, calling his mooching scheme a failed operation when Glasses grabbed his arm. Stood and nodded like a general off to war. "UA preaches camaraderie as being an essential character of a Pro Hero. A team is only as strong as their weakest link," he stared at him when saying that last part. _Gee_, Katsuki thought, _gee._ "It's my job as a comrade to help. Yes!" Glasses slapped both hands onto his shoulders. "I'm not one to back away from a challenge. From now on let's be study buddies!"

[_Is this guy's energy for real?_]

_Ah_, Katsuki thought. Suddenly bleak_,…is that so?_

.

Glasses brought him to the cafeteria where they join a small little group of classmates. They are surprised at his arrival in particular. Like a herd of penguins watching a crocodile stroll up to their glacier.

Katsuki found himself leering around the hall for All Might's lumbering form throughout the chitter chatters until a bob-haired girl leaned into sight.

"Who are you looking for?"

"All Might," Katsuki said, "Have you seen him?"

The girl 'aah'd. "No. Have you?"

"Not yet."

"Good luck! I'm Uraraka, by the way," she offered her hand. Katsuki shook it in monitored strength.

"Katsuki."

"Are you one of All Might's fanboy's?" Some kid with long earlobes asked next to Uraraka. "Like, a hardcore one?"

"You're mistaking me for that guy Deku."

"Dek-who?"

"No, Deku," Katsuki corrected. "All Might's serious shit to him. He's convinced the sun shines out of his ass."

She asked what his deal was then with scoping out All Might. Everyone these days was so curious about everyone else. Like their life depended on the knowledge of others. Katsuki pitied the young generation.

So Katsuki told her "Hey, _relax _earlobes_." _

This didn't go down well and pretty quick she was huffing and puffing in bewildered indignation.

"If I were you," Glasses said with a studious palm gesture, "I would cease calling her earlobes."

.

Somewhere around the end of lessons, Glasses is unable to convince him to join him at a coffee shop to study. Nevertheless Katsuki still finds himself there. Out of stupid loyalty to the mooching agreement.

They were ten minutes into the studying when Katsuki noticed something horrific.

"Are you planning out a study schedule?"

"For both of us, yes. It helps give us a guideline of - "

"Never mind," said Katsuki and gulped down a scorching mouthful of tea. Oh christ, Katsuki thought. He made a deal with a grade-obsessed lunatic.

Katsuki accepted the schedule and watched as Glasses reviewed the first chapters of the syllabus on each subject. By the time they parted ways the sun was creeping towards the horizon and Katsuki was firmly missing the Cat Cafe.

A text from his father tells him to be home by nine - train lines back up and running.

It was currently around five.

He took a train to the hospital and spotted someone he's grown accustomed to lingering around enterance. Twig, blonde man in the company of another healthier looking fellow.

"Hey, Yagi," greeted Katsuki in a wave. "Here to see Deku?"

"Young Midoriya, yes," Yagi introduced his fellow. A name that Katsuki immediately forgets.

"We've met. Good to see you again."

"Oh, yeah," Katsuki drew up a blank. "See you inside, Yagi." He high-tailed it inside.

[_"Still no word?" Asked Yagi, letting himself get steered farther from the entry as Katsuki left. _

_"Whoever your stalker is, they've been real quiet recently. We know they aren't violent, probably a curious fan."_

_They leave it at that.]_

_._

Deku grilled him thoroughly on the day.

"Lost!" He exclaimed. "_Lost_. At UA!"

"Lost," said Katsuki with a shrug. "This wild guy Wolfy helped though. His outer appearance betrays his soft soul. I liked him."

"There's no hero working at UA that goes by the name - oh!" Deku clapped, "You mean Hound dog."

Katsuki gave it some thought, "Dunno." He said. "I don't think so."

"You do," Deku insisted, "mean Hound Dog."

"Beats me," said Katsuki and continued to get grilled.

.

Katsuki stayed until Yagi arrived. By then it was seven something and he makes a pitstop at a vending machine. He fed it a bill and punched the right set of code to give him a packet of M&Ms.

For a time, he sat in a waiting room munching on sugarcoated chocolate and watching tv spit out news reports that distracted guests. Waiting for news on All Might.

It was a stone bummer from start to finish. No sightings.

.

He visited Granny before school the next day.

"Gonna have one hell of a trip today, brat," she laughed as she rolled up some grass and started smoking it. Katsuki ate a nut-butter sandwich bestowed upon him when he had arrived. It was already half-eaten, but it was the sentiment behind it that mattered.

Soon enough the room was engulfed in a haze from the both of them as they shared the smoke. Katsuki liked this.

This moment of refuge from the outrageous world.

"Make good choices," is Granny's words to him on his way out.

Hah.

.

Thoughts? feelings?


	6. Chapter Six

...

Chapter Five

...

Katsuki's hand is on the doorknob in the back entrance of Cat Cafe when he is lured inside by a gibbering semi-adult with the head of a corgi. He glanced over at their reflection in the glass door that led to the kitchens as he was led past it to behind the counter. The man remained a dog.

Being early and a work day, there were only two customers.

"Hey," Katsuki said, back being thumped by a seperate worker. This one female and human-looking. "Am I being kidnapped?"

"This guy." The man woofed. "We worked the evening shift together for the past year."

Twenty minutes. That's how long he had left before first period. The man handed him a blueberry muffin. Of course, Katsuki accepted and pocketed it. This disturbed the workers.

"We mustn't have talked much then," Katsuki reasoned.

"We talked all the time," the woman blinked.

Katsuki couldn't remember. "Oh yeah," he said straight-faced. He must have ignored her then. "I remember now. How have you - _been_?"

They gibbered some vague typical responses. Katsuki eyed the clock. Wondering how to make a quick getaway.

"- heard Kat died. You knew Kat, right?"

"Which cat? There's a lot, this is a cat cafe -"

"Kat with a K you idiot," repeated the woman. Her blonde hair catching morning sun through the windows. "She pickpocketed us a couple times. Sure was a lot of troubled but she didn't deserve to die."

They glance at him as though expecting him to care that some random criminal he didn't know got murdered.

He held his hands up as if to shrug, said "Sounds fucked"

[u_nable to tell if he meant it sarcastically or not]_

muttered a quick goodbye and sprinted off.

Sixteen minutes.

...

Concrete crunched beneath his feet like bone china as he dashed through the city like a mad man. Up the steep hike to UA, he fore-went the trying walk-lane and hitched it to the trees. Leaping from one branch to the next.

_[More often than not through]_

Up ahead he spotted the metallic gated entrance Wolfy waving guards to shut the gate. Katsuki shrieked, pushed off the branch in an explosion and shot himself through the hundred metre distance. In a blur he whizzed past Hound Dog and skidded across pavement. Sneakers squeaking and smelling of burnt rubber.

"_Safe_." He hissed.

"**Bakugou**," he heard Wolfy growl just as he sped off again.

...

"Slow down before you hit someone!" Glasses snatched Katsuki in mid-run the moment he flashed into the classroom.

"Yeah," Katsuki said, or thought and paced his way to his seat in the back. Some red haired kid went to fist bump him -

[_"Man that was wicked fast! Such a manly entrance."]_

\- he dropped into his seat and stared up at Glasses who sat on the edge of his desk. Chattering about this and that. Katsuki stared out his window. From it he could spot Wolfy at the entrance, yelling at a janitor to clean the skid mark he had made.

" - All Might - "

Every cell in his brain shocked to attention. "What about All Might?"

"He's going to teach us today!" The red haired guy popped up besides Glasses. Wearing a fine big smile. Arms waving around like a lunatic "Awesome, right? I hear his muscles are bigger than my face!"

"Right" said Katsuki. "And when will this be?"

_[I can finally ask him, thought Katsuki. _

_How would he respond, wondered Katsuki._

_Is he already _**_here_**_?]_

Suspense was never something Katsuki or Saitama could endure. To know the man he has been hunting for months was in the palm of his hand and unable to grasp was one for the shit books. It was intolerable.

Katsuki grounded his teeth.

Mood plunged into a funk.

"Oi," red headed guy tapped his desk. He appeared worried. Spiked eyebrows crinkling like a baby's butt-cheek, "Do you think he'll have us do what sensei did yesterday? Maybe I should do some reps before he comes. So I don't embarrass myself."

"That sounds like an admirable goal," Glasses proclaimed. "What about you, Bakugou?"

"Rat-bastard won't shimmy away today," he muttered. Shrewd eyes searching for that really big fucker's figure outside.

[_"Did he just call All Might - "_

_"I believe so."_

_"…Righteous._"]

...

Mercifully, the recess bell chimes and Katsuki - contentedly looking at the sky with his mind off - pings back into place. Fiendish with an ambitious frenzy for one larger than life blonde man.

Standing he is immediately on the receiving end of Aizawa's stare.

"Stay behind," he ordered. Not friendly.

Katsuki froze, "What the hell did I do?" He asked Red Head. The boy shrugged an unhelpful shrug. Muttered something vague, and sauntered off to grab some grub. He stood watching everyone file out and wandered over to Aizawa. "Eeerr."

"Bakugou," Aizawa said. Definitely unfriendly. "Our talk yesterday about UA's distaste for half-assery. Do you remember it?"

Certainly not. "Yeah?"

The man's eyes narrowed. Capillaries red and bloody. Katsuki studied them. "The sole reason you are here right now is because of your quirks' potential. The test I had you do yesterday only goes to show it."

Aizawa continued his stare.

"Yeah…?"

"You broke it," he said. In the most bitter way imaginable. "I've looked through your academic record," he taps a file on his desk Katsukie takes to believing is his. "Before last year you were a prodigy. Topped every class, every year - before the _incident, _you were brilliant."

The classroom drowns into silence and Katsuki began to sweat.

[_The man knew something_]

"Well," he said, avoiding Aizawa's intense stare-down. "Well," he said again. "That's embarrassing isn't it?"

Aizawa breathed a sigh. Attempting for a more gentler demeanour. "Your report states you didn't see a counsellor after the attack. I've talked to the headmaster and he agrees that you should meet with out school councillor."

"Man," Katsuki said. Aizawa almost had him there. "That's unnecessary."

"The principle and I called your parents to discuss it in further detail later this afternoon," Aizawa continued."You must realise, that if they agree it will be mandatory."

"Why?"

The man blinked. "Because you are a minor. It's the law."

Katsuki's age processed in his mind. Numbers bundling together in a tangled knot. "This is serious," he muttered.

[_"It is," Aizawa looked down at the file. Tapping it. "Truth aside, you think you really got into 1A because of a simple explosion quirk? There are thousands others like you out there. Certainly powerful and grandiose. You're here because All Might and Nezu saw potential in you. Who you are and what you've achieved. That's not something to waste."_

_"Get counselling, don't get counselling. No one but you can choose what you become or what path you take. All I can promise you is that you have the power to make it an extraordinary one." He stared at Katsuki. Solemn. "_**_Once_**_ you release your burden."_]

His adult films.

He can't buy them!

...

Locating the school map -at last, Katsuki squinted. Scrutinising it for the location All Might would likely be.

He flipped out his phone, and dialled a number that would surely know.

'Kaa -'

"Hey shithead," greeted Katsuki, "would All Might most likely lurk about in a school filled with kids?"

'…you make it sound like he's some sort of predator,' Deku spoke. 'which he is not!'

Katsuki hummed agreeably. "Where would he be?"

'Isn't it recess? And aren't you not allowed to use your phones?'

"Those rules are for kids."

'Kaachan, you _are_ a kid.'

"Probably," Katsuki shrugged. Not one to dwell. "Deku, where'd you think All Might be at?"

'I dunno,' Deku mumbled. 'Somewhere.'

That's shady. "Help me out here."

'Why you wanna know?'

Very shady.

"Why so evasive. Deku?" Katsuki interrogated. "out of all the people in Japan,_ you'd_ know best."

'I am not! Evasive? Me? Hah!' He denied sounding somewhat suspicious.

"Admit it you fungus haired punk."

'fungus -?!'

"_De-_ku."

Deku grumbled. Making his displeasure more noticeable than an atomic bomb. 'He _might_ be in the staff room.'

"Thanks. Remember to take your medicine."

'That was _one time! And don't you dare hang up without saying goodby-'_

Katsuki hung up without saying goodbye.

...

The staff room opens before Katsuki could knock. Almost having him kiss the chest of red cloaked cowboy.

Despite the face being masked by what Katsuki could only describe as a bad attempt at covering a nose job gone wrong, he could sense the feeling of bewilderment and homicide. Cowboy man cursed.

"Need something?"

"All Might," he requested simply and reasonably.

The man stretched his neck and spread his limbs slightly. Blocking view of the interior. "Ain't in right now. Go back to the cafeteria kid and buy yourself a bottle of milk."

Katsuki looked at the oddly spread out man.

"I don't know about anyone else," he said, "but I'm getting the feeling you're full of shit. Stinky stinky, night after Indian curry shit. The kind that ruins relationships, _hah_, if you've ever _had_ one -" Katsuki bent underneath the whip of a gun to his face and flounced inside the staff room while Cowboy began a one-sided shoot-out.

About half of the staff room was spread out the way one would expect - cubicles, computers, papers, the odd weapon and scorch mark here and there - the other half looked to be dedicated to pure, shamelessly plush lounge furniture. It was back there where the glorious, muscular form of All Might in a yellow and black pinstripe suit stared at him. Bewildered beyond belief.

"Young Bakugou!"

Katsuki wore that strange look people get when their food arrives at a restaurant, "Hey, big guy, I challenge you to a fight."

The impeding large man looked to his fellow colleagues - startled with a hint of reassignment - then back at him. And laughed. "Young Bakugou, heh, you sure do have an unusual sense of humour. I, Number One hero cannot fight my very student!"

_[Katuski could hardly hear the muffled laughter. _

_Mind sinking under the weight of all those buried questions of Saitama's and histheirs. _

_How can you laugh so freely?]_

In a push that has concrete collapsing under the ball of his shoe and sorted papers flying, Katsuki is across the room. Arm flung back with a fist aimed straight for All Might's turned head.

Blue eyes swerve to meet Katsuki's.

All Might just barely catches his exploding fist.

And doesn't plant his feet.

The punch smacked him to the end of the office as though he were pulled by wires. Leaving a specific, All Might indent in the wall. Debris plumes like a pop of sudden fog and Katsuki is left to dodge another bullet from cowboy bebop from behind. Returned and furious. A swipe from a busty woman's rope and whatever the heck the blonde man from orientation day sent his way with his bulky neck speakers.

"Enough," All Might yelled within seconds. Suit disgruntled and mouth firm. The debris had settled and Katsuki is mildly shocked at how quick the man appears in front of him like a protective barrier. "Young Bakugou meant no harm," he pointedly fingers his comrades, smile awkward."He is my student, and my responsibility to deal with."

"I'm all for love squabbles, but he _attacked_ you - " the busty lady is silenced in a quick glance from All Might.

"Just to make it clear" Cowboy said. Bitterly. Stepping around Katsuki and All Might, guns aimed comfortably. "If he tries again, I'm shooting the kneecaps."

"Like to see you try, stinky caped bitch," Katsuki challenged.

Cowboy's guns are immediately confiscated by the lanky mic man as All Might hastily directed them out of the room.

"Young Bakugou," All Might chuckled. Not the happy kind. "You should learn to conduct yourself in a more appropriate manner."

"Sure," he said, "Hey, isn't it boring being the number one hero?"

The question has All Might halting in the hallway. "That's an unusual question."

"I felt you out with my punch and you're the first guy to ever catch it, so I can tell you must be strong. But your eyes, they're not dead. You still have a purpose, what is it?"

All Might erred. "My purpose Young Bakugou is to help people."

"That's nice, but seriously."

There was a dangerous pause.

"I _am_ being serious." Said All Might. Staring him down.

"Oh," Katsuki said dismally.

_[and in the silence of the hallway,_

_ Katsuki found all the time he spent hunting All Might down, _

_Waiting for him to appear like a shining night as villains rampaged through cities,_

_getting his clothes dirty while standing in the middle of bloodshed and destruction,_

_ignoring bargains when the word 'All Might' is uttered,_

_Was for shit _

_The man was a sentimentalist._

_They went together as well as oil and water.]_

"Then," Katsuki bowed and sagged off.

[_"D-Detention!" All Might stuttered_. _"Ah... he's ignoring me isn't he?"_]

...


End file.
